Octopus Overlords

LordMortis wrote:For my entire life, I have held separate spheres of acquaintances and that was by design. I have been careful what gets said to who. That changed in mid 2016 and that djinni is out of the bottle. Silence is no longer a (re)solution, and that makes me sad. Life was much better and way easier when I felt like it was worthy luxury to keep everyone in their separate little ven diagrammed boxes. I don't like screaming political approvals or disapproval from the rooftops but it seems so very necessary. Now, the only separate sphere I have is work, where I still try really hard to remain apolitical but even that force field is weakening.

Virginia Governor Terry McAuliffe has said one of the reasons the police failed to control the violence during a white supremacist rally in Charlottesville was because militia members at the rally were armed with "better equipment" than the state police themselves.

“It’s easy to criticise, but I can tell you this, 80 per cent of the people here had semiautomatic weapons," Mr McAuliffe said.

Kurth wrote:Have there been reliable accounts of the numbers present in Charlottesville, both for the white supremacists and the counter-protesters? The only report I saw was that the Nazi-like torch lit parade drew about 250 marchers. That doesn't seem all that impressive to me.

To hear the media coverage of this, there's a massive, burgeoning neo-Nazi movement in this country. Is that really supported by the numbers involved?

Haven't small groups of white power idiots been a near constant over the years? I get that now that they feel they are getting at least tacit support from the White House, and they may have grown more vocal and empowered, but have their numbers actually grown?

Watching the coverage of Charlottesville, I can't help but feel there are parallels with the way the media covers any terror-related incident. Why are people so afraid of terrorism when they have a significantly better chance of dying from walking outside and having a brick fall on their head? That's rhetorical, but I'll answer it anyway: Because the media is in the business of feeding fear.

Alefroth wrote:

Kurth wrote:Have there been reliable accounts of the numbers present in Charlottesville, both for the white supremacists and the counter-protesters? The only report I saw was that the Nazi-like torch lit parade drew about 250 marchers. That doesn't seem all that impressive to me.

To hear the media coverage of this, there's a massive, burgeoning neo-Nazi movement in this country. Is that really supported by the numbers involved?

Haven't small groups of white power idiots been a near constant over the years? I get that now that they feel they are getting at least tacit support from the White House, and they may have grown more vocal and empowered, but have their numbers actually grown?

Watching the coverage of Charlottesville, I can't help but feel there are parallels with the way the media covers any terror-related incident. Why are people so afraid of terrorism when they have a significantly better chance of dying from walking outside and having a brick fall on their head? That's rhetorical, but I'll answer it anyway: Because the media is in the business of feeding fear.

Does it have to be a massive, burgeoning movement to be a concern?

What does crowd size matter if one of them is willing to drive a car into a crowd?

ImLawBoy wrote:

Alefroth wrote:

Kurth wrote:Have there been reliable accounts of the numbers present in Charlottesville, both for the white supremacists and the counter-protesters? The only report I saw was that the Nazi-like torch lit parade drew about 250 marchers. That doesn't seem all that impressive to me.

To hear the media coverage of this, there's a massive, burgeoning neo-Nazi movement in this country. Is that really supported by the numbers involved?

Haven't small groups of white power idiots been a near constant over the years? I get that now that they feel they are getting at least tacit support from the White House, and they may have grown more vocal and empowered, but have their numbers actually grown?

Watching the coverage of Charlottesville, I can't help but feel there are parallels with the way the media covers any terror-related incident. Why are people so afraid of terrorism when they have a significantly better chance of dying from walking outside and having a brick fall on their head? That's rhetorical, but I'll answer it anyway: Because the media is in the business of feeding fear.

Does it have to be a massive, burgeoning movement to be a concern?

What does crowd size matter if one of them is willing to drive a car into a crowd?

Is there a difference of concern is the march is 250 people vs. 10,000?

ImLawBoy wrote: Is there a difference of concern is the march is 250 people vs. 10,000?

Max Peck wrote:

ImLawBoy wrote:

Alefroth wrote:

Kurth wrote:Have there been reliable accounts of the numbers present in Charlottesville, both for the white supremacists and the counter-protesters? The only report I saw was that the Nazi-like torch lit parade drew about 250 marchers. That doesn't seem all that impressive to me.

To hear the media coverage of this, there's a massive, burgeoning neo-Nazi movement in this country. Is that really supported by the numbers involved?

Haven't small groups of white power idiots been a near constant over the years? I get that now that they feel they are getting at least tacit support from the White House, and they may have grown more vocal and empowered, but have their numbers actually grown?

Watching the coverage of Charlottesville, I can't help but feel there are parallels with the way the media covers any terror-related incident. Why are people so afraid of terrorism when they have a significantly better chance of dying from walking outside and having a brick fall on their head? That's rhetorical, but I'll answer it anyway: Because the media is in the business of feeding fear.

Does it have to be a massive, burgeoning movement to be a concern?

What does crowd size matter if one of them is willing to drive a car into a crowd?

Is there a difference of concern is the march is 250 people vs. 10,000?

The number of Nazi marchers at any one rally is much less concerning than the fact that there is one President who seemingly has their back.

Alefroth wrote:

ImLawBoy wrote: Is there a difference of concern is the march is 250 people vs. 10,000?

Of course.

Do you think the media is over-reporting these instances?

Thousands of white supremacists and armed militia groups faced off with counter-protesters during a violent and chaotic rally that raged for hours in this Virginia city on Saturday, resulting in the deaths of at least three people.

ImLawBoy wrote:

Max Peck wrote:

ImLawBoy wrote:

Alefroth wrote:

Kurth wrote:Have there been reliable accounts of the numbers present in Charlottesville, both for the white supremacists and the counter-protesters? The only report I saw was that the Nazi-like torch lit parade drew about 250 marchers. That doesn't seem all that impressive to me.

To hear the media coverage of this, there's a massive, burgeoning neo-Nazi movement in this country. Is that really supported by the numbers involved?

Haven't small groups of white power idiots been a near constant over the years? I get that now that they feel they are getting at least tacit support from the White House, and they may have grown more vocal and empowered, but have their numbers actually grown?

Watching the coverage of Charlottesville, I can't help but feel there are parallels with the way the media covers any terror-related incident. Why are people so afraid of terrorism when they have a significantly better chance of dying from walking outside and having a brick fall on their head? That's rhetorical, but I'll answer it anyway: Because the media is in the business of feeding fear.

Does it have to be a massive, burgeoning movement to be a concern?

What does crowd size matter if one of them is willing to drive a car into a crowd?

Is there a difference of concern is the march is 250 people vs. 10,000?

The number of Nazi marchers at any one rally is much less concerning than the fact that there is one President who seemingly has their back.

Also, water is wet.

I think its a legit question (and one I'm interested in, too). How big are these rallies? Are they getting bigger? Is the movement growing, or will we see a backlash against them that will reduce them (or at least drive them back underground)?

Max Peck wrote:

ImLawBoy wrote:

Max Peck wrote:

ImLawBoy wrote:

Alefroth wrote:

Kurth wrote:Have there been reliable accounts of the numbers present in Charlottesville, both for the white supremacists and the counter-protesters? The only report I saw was that the Nazi-like torch lit parade drew about 250 marchers. That doesn't seem all that impressive to me.

To hear the media coverage of this, there's a massive, burgeoning neo-Nazi movement in this country. Is that really supported by the numbers involved?

Haven't small groups of white power idiots been a near constant over the years? I get that now that they feel they are getting at least tacit support from the White House, and they may have grown more vocal and empowered, but have their numbers actually grown?

Watching the coverage of Charlottesville, I can't help but feel there are parallels with the way the media covers any terror-related incident. Why are people so afraid of terrorism when they have a significantly better chance of dying from walking outside and having a brick fall on their head? That's rhetorical, but I'll answer it anyway: Because the media is in the business of feeding fear.

Does it have to be a massive, burgeoning movement to be a concern?

What does crowd size matter if one of them is willing to drive a car into a crowd?

Is there a difference of concern is the march is 250 people vs. 10,000?

The number of Nazi marchers at any one rally is much less concerning than the fact that there is one President who seemingly has their back.

Also, water is wet.

I think its a legit question (and one I'm interested in, too). How big are these rallies? Are they getting bigger? Is the movement growing, or will we see a backlash against them that will reduce them (or at least drive them back underground)?

If only organizations like the Southern Poverty Law Center promulgated such information, so that concerned citizens could look it up instead of settling for slinging forum snark.

After a day of work at the Engineering Research Center at the University of Arkansas, Kyle Quinn had a pleasant Friday night in Bentonville with his wife and a colleague. They explored an art exhibition at the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art and dined at an upscale restaurant.

Then on Saturday, he discovered that social media sleuths had incorrectly identified him as a participant in a white nationalist rally some 1,100 miles away in Charlottesville, Va. Overnight, thousands of strangers across the country had been working together to share photographs of the men bearing Tiki torches on the University of Virginia campus. They wanted to name and shame them to their employers, friends and neighbors. In a few cases, they succeeded.

But Mr. Quinn’s experience showed the risks.

A man at the rally had been photographed wearing an “Arkansas Engineering” shirt, and the amateur investigators found a photo of Mr. Quinn that looked somewhat similar. They were both bearded and had similar builds.

By internet frenzy standards, that was proof enough.

LordMortis wrote: Dog Whistle?

FakeNewsCNN wrote:"There are two sides to a story," Trump said, adding that there were "a lot of bad people in the other group too," referring to the counterprotesters.

He added that there were also "good people" on both sides, including those marching in the white nationalism rally.

"Are you against the Confederacy?" is a really strange question to have to ask a US president in 2017.

— Dell Cameron (@dellcam) August 15, 2017

… Even stranger that there wasn’t an answer.

— Nick Ashton-Hart (@nashtonhart) August 15, 2017

ImLawBoy wrote:This is surreal.

The President of the United States just described some people who marched with neo-Nazis and white supremacists as “very fine people.”

— Gary Parrish (@GaryParrishCBS) August 15, 2017

YellowKing wrote:The thing is, EVEN IF you gave Trump every benefit of the doubt, and in his ham-handed way he was just trying to make the point that human beings are not black and white. And that in every corrupt soul there can be found a spirit of goodness, and in every saint a tiny bit of evil......

YOU DON'T CHOOSE NAZIS VS NON-RACIST PEOPLE TO MAKE THAT POINT!

He is so unbelievably tone-deaf that this lack of judgment alone should preclude him from holding this job.

P.S. CNN is now in full "Fuck This Guy" mode.

YellowKing wrote:

FakeNewsCNN wrote:"There are two sides to a story," Trump said, adding that there were "a lot of bad people in the other group too," referring to the counterprotesters.

He added that there were also "good people" on both sides, including those marching in the white nationalism rally.

Public: "There's no way Trump could have a worse day than he had a few days ago."
Trump: "Hold my beer."

Not many presidents could make threatening nuclear war the second worst thing he did in a week.

— Gady Epstein (@gadyepstein) August 12, 2017

ImLawBoy wrote:If you're going to chastise people for flinging forum snark, you'd best invest in a hair shirt. That said, making blatantly obvious statements that don't address the issue raised is often the cause of snark. Perhaps you could have provided some info from the SPLC to advance the conversation in a more productive direction. I had done a cursory search prior to my post, but only found the 250 figure that Kurth referenced, but it seemed to be only about the people attending the Tiki march the night before, and not about the rally the following day.

Max Peck wrote:

ImLawBoy wrote:If you're going to chastise people for flinging forum snark, you'd best invest in a hair shirt. That said, making blatantly obvious statements that don't address the issue raised is often the cause of snark. Perhaps you could have provided some info from the SPLC to advance the conversation in a more productive direction. I had done a cursory search prior to my post, but only found the 250 figure that Kurth referenced, but it seemed to be only about the people attending the Tiki march the night before, and not about the rally the following day.

I've never denied that I'm a sarcastic asshole. When someone goes out of their way to point out (justly, there is no doubt) that my comments are shallow and superficial, I'm merely inclined to acknowledge their effort.

The Southern Poverty Law Center hasn’t counted the members of the so-called “alt-right.” A press representative tells The Daily Beast that they’re not aware of any nationwide surveys designed to count them. However, they estimate that the KKK counts between 5,000 and 8,000 members nationwide. Back in the 1920’s, when cities across the south were erecting monuments to Confederate generals, the Klan had 4 million members. As Roger L. Simon points out, this would be an impressive decrease even if the population of the U.S. hadn’t swelled since the 1920’s. Back then, the Klan constituted about 4 percent of the entire U.S. population. Now, the KKK is near its nadir. That would make them less than 0.003 percent of the population, even on the higher end of the SPLC’s estimate. “It’s a small group of real bad people,” Simon writes.